


Keeping the Earth Warm

by ReachForTheStars



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-03
Updated: 2018-11-03
Packaged: 2019-08-17 04:56:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16509743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReachForTheStars/pseuds/ReachForTheStars
Summary: It was an unstable world, an impossible world, a world that never was. But the people living in it didn't know that, and so they did what people do: they lived, they loved, they fought, and eventually they died.These are documents from the world without stars, the world that brought Amelia Pond to open the Pandorica.





	Keeping the Earth Warm

"...but it was not immediately obvious that the Moon was a solid body similar in some respects to Earth. An obscure Italian mathematician named Galileo Galilei, known primarily for his contributions to optics, appears to have also been the first to use a telescope to observe geological features on the Moon. His work was suppressed by order of the Pope, but the spread of knowledge of optics made the true nature of the Moon impossible to conceal..."  
\-- _Introduction to Selenology_ , Fourth Edition, 1982  
  
"The currently well-established practices of solar and lunar navigation could not be used without reliable timepieces that could function at sea. As the motion of ships made both pendulum and hourglass timepieces unreliable, long sea voyages remained extremely risky until the development of the fusee in the 1560s made accurate spring-driven clocks possible. This is generally considered to be the beginning of the Age of Discovery...  
...King Phillip II of Spain, known as "the Prudent", refused to support de Legazpi's proposed expedition across the Atlantic. This may have been partly due to the total loss of a fleet, commanded by an Italian merchant, sent on a similar errand by Phillip's father Ferdinand in 1492. de Lagazpi then turned to King Sebastian of Portugal, who agreed to provide financial support for an expedition in 1568. The tremendous results of this investment are one reason King Sebastian continues to be idolized throughout the Portuguese-speaking world...  
...and therefore it was not a Norwegian, but the English explorer Sir Thomas Cavendish, who re-established contact with the Icelandic Norse in 1571. European records and Icelandic oral traditions concur that it was the first ship to reach Iceland in almost two hundred years. Cavendish was shocked by the state of the Icelanders, who, in the absence of iron for tools, wood for houses, and any contact with the Holy Church, had largely reverted to primitive pagan tribes. Cavendish's expedition also discovered Kalalit, the larger landmass to the north..."  
\-- _Miguel de Lagazpi and the Age of Discovery_ , Second Edition, 1978  
  
"The Lutheran heresy holds that the Traditions of the Holy Church are to be ignored, and that Scripture alone, interpreted however lay members wish, is the sole authority on matters of Christian faith. Those souls thus led astray by the Devil may be identified through this belief, as they may speak against the supreme authority of the Pope, particularly in matters of purgatory in the void above..."  
\--Instructions for the Holy Roman Inquisition (translation from Latin), 1638  
  
"The continued resistance of the northern provinces to the lawful and rightful edicts of the Holy Emperor Ferdinand, as established in the Westphalia Capitulation, is not to be tolerated. All heretics who do not recant their heretical beliefs and confess their sins shall be burned...The Emperor protects. _Renovatio Imperii_."  
\--Proclamation of Albrecht von Wallenstein (translation), 1642  
  
"The Colony of Virginia, chartered in 1632 and settled in 1633, was the first enduring English colony in North America, following a failed proprietary attempt at settlement on Newfoundland in 1610."  
\--"Colony of Virginia", Groupedia  
  
"Whether the Sun travels about the Earth, or the reverse, is immaterial. It is manifestly clear that Sun, Earth, and Moon alone exist. Whether the seat of God's throne is on the Moon, the Sun, or beyond either, is equally immaterial. It is manifestly clear that Almighty God has created this Earth, and this Earth alone, that we may live upon it, for that short span of years before we go to judgment. Through the will of God did the Pope take his seat in Rome, and maintain his benevolent authority over us; through the will of God were the heresies purged from this island, and from the Germanies; through the will of God, peace has been maintained in this realm by the pious King Charles; through the will of God, the Easterners were subjugated by the infidel Turk, in punishment for their disobedience. And, through the will and the mercy and the glory of God, we may ascend to Heaven, upon departing this Earth."  
\--Speech to the assembled clergy of England by the Archbishop of Canterbury, 1650  
  
"The significance of the 'stars' should not be underestimated. The belief that there should be 'stars' in the sky is a representation of conflict in our subconscious between the ego and the id, in which the infantile fear of the dark wishes to be satisfied by persistent light in the sky, but the ego rejects this as delusional, resulting in visions of the sky's partial illumination. This is supported by the fact that such illusions are most common when the moon is new, so that the darkness is absolute, in the absence of artificial light."  
\--Translated from the writings of Herr Sigmund Freud, c. 1920  
  
"When the moon was dark, Tom on a lark  
Walked in the pitch-black night  
Came a cloud of dread, called Vasha-Ned,  
It left only his bones white."  
\--Children's rhyme popular in Great Britain, first recorded c. 1850  
  
"Eosology (from the Greek _eos_ , meaning "dawn") is the belief that the Sun guides the activities of human beings and determines the appearance and traits of children in order to prepare us for our ultimate destiny. Eosologists claim that our reality is not the 'true' one, and that the Sun acts to ensure that people who should fall in love in the 'true' reality do so, so that we will be able to restore the 'true' reality when the time comes to do so. Some adherents believe that this will be done by a powerful  'doctor', who they claim was involved in the construction of Stonehenge and the mysterious stone cube found under it. Eosology is sometimes confused with heliology, the scientific study of the Sun. Eosology is widely regarded as a form of psuedoscience."  
\--"Eosology", Groupedia  
  
"The level of interest in the field which you have begun to study is due to the many questions that remain unanswered about the Sun. The Sun's behavior appears to be qualitatively different from that of the Earth, the Moon, and bodies near them. Analysis of Earth's orbit about the Sun would imply that the Sun's mass is extremely large, on the order of 10^30 kilograms. Regardless, its effect on the Moon's orbit is smaller than can be measured, implying a mass orders of magnitude lower. Does the Sun not obey Newton's Principle? Is there some additional force applied to the Moon - or to the Earth? Secondly, spectral analysis reveals spectral lines from the Sun not observed from any known element on Earth, including the highly unstable elements synthesized in recent years...This may imply that the Sun is not composed of nuclear matter, that much larger nuclei can form in the Sun than is possible on Earth or the Moon, or something else entirely. And most importantly, how does the Sun emit light? Realistically, chemical reactions could not have supported the Sun for the thousands of years of recorded human history, let alone the millions postulated by the evolutionist school of biology. Durations allowed by nuclear reactions are more consistent, but the Sun's emissions do not correspond to those of any known nuclear reaction. Is the Sun, in fact, a unique creation of God, Allah, or Zeus, ignoring the laws applying to the rest of the universe? Seeing the results discussed above has caused many scientists to, essentially, throw up their hands."  
\--Introduction, _The Science of Heliology,_ Second Edition, 1975  
  
"...however, alternate explanations for the motion of the Moon about the Earth persisted, and Newton's Principle was not generally accepted until Cavendish's experiments in 1806 showed a measurable attraction between masses in the laboratory."  
\--Early version of "Gravity", Groupedia  
  
"Frustration grew in the Eleven Colonies during the reign of King George the Third because of his growing insanity, but the threat from the French and Native American tribes forced the colonists to continue to obey his demands for taxes, under the threat of the withdrawal of British troops..."  
\-- _The American Adventure_ , Sixth Edition, 1999  
  
"The Pope in Rome has been the unceasing ally of the monstrous and treacherous King. We must cast them both off, and at once! What need do we have of discussion when all are in agreement?  The Courts and the Curia alike are a workshop for crime, the foyer for corruption, and the den of tyrants. The history of kings, and of the Pope, is the martyrology of nations!"  
\--Speech of Henri Jean-Baptiste Grégoire in support of abolition of the monarchy and the Church (translated from French), 1802  
  
"With neither guidance nor precedent for what they had embarked upon, the most radical Montagnards quickly took power in the new General Assembly of France. Insane proclamation followed insane proclamation: King Louis XVII was deposed, Papal authority was abolished, and the Cult of Reason was proclaimed in the span of a few months of 1802. Indeed, by October of that year, it was no longer the year 1802, but Year 1 of the French Republic. The situation has been compared to holding the lid on a boiling pot: the longer Louis' father had held it on, the more extreme the pressure had become. His death in 1801 caused the grip of the _ancien regime_ to slip, and madness ensued in France."  
\--An English history text, 1891  
  
"I am the King now, and all Spaniards shall obey me. There will be no constitution, no concessions to the mob, and no relinquishing of my divine power. My father was foolish and weak, and fate has now avenged me upon him."  
\--Statement (possibly) made by King Ferdinand VII upon hearing of his father's death in a hunting accident, 1801  
  
"The king has spat upon our petitions, trampled upon our laws, and ignored the needs of the common people. He has virtually subjugated us to Portugal through his cowardly concessions of our few remaining possessions in the New World. He is selfish, grasping, suspicious, and vengeful. We, the duly designated representatives of the Spanish people, will no longer suffer his rule...we extend a hand of friendship to our French comrades..."  
\--Declaration of the Supreme Central Junta (translation), 1803  
  
"It was a damned close-run thing. The balance could have tipped the other way. But once the Spaniards arrived, we never had a bloody chance."  
\--The Duke of Wellington, 1814  
  
"Great Britain entered into the Grand Coalition against the French and Spanish Republics in 1804. Parliament soon passed what became known as the Intolerable Acts, demanding heavy tax payments to support the war. President Napoleon wisely chose to ally with the patriots in the Eleven Colonies rather than invade them, offering peace and territory in Canada to an independent country...the Declaration of Independence was signed in 1806...following the surrender of General Henry Clinton's army in Boston in 1807, Regent George IV decided that the United States had become too strong to defeat (given the dire situations in Portugal and Austria), and Great Britain formally recognized American independence in 1808."  
\-- _The American Adventure_ , Sixth Edition, 1999  
  
"The Republic of France stands with her ally Spain in the expulsion of the Papists and seizure of Church assets for the benefit of the state and the people. Religion only exists to keep the poor from murdering the rich. We have generously allowed the Germanies and Britain to retain their independence, but our generosity shall go no further. Long live the Cult of Reason!"  
\--Speech of President Napoleon Bonaparte of the French Republic (translation), 1816  
  
"This paper considers the possibility that an extremely large mass of hydrogen gas with certain impurities could, under gravitational compression, spontaneously produce thermonuclear fusion reactions at its core, thereby producing radiation which would illuminate and heat a hypothetical orbiting Earth-like body. The characteristics and behavior of such a mass are evaluated, and the consequences for our understanding of the behavior of the Sun considered. It is shown that such a system could theoretically exist, but would require a mass of hydrogen gas exceeding that of all hydrogen known to exist, and that such a process cannot adequately support the longevity of the Sun."  
\--Abstract of a paper rejected by the _Journal of Physics_ in 2004  
  
"That's one small step for a human...one giant leap for humanity."  
\--Sally Ride (setting foot on the Moon's surface), 1986

**Author's Note:**

> In case you didn't catch the influence the TARDIS had on people writing about it, look at the sentences in the heliology book passage again.


End file.
